Contents

Background

Mother Goose is a character in / imaginary author of the fairy tale nursery rhymes Mother Goose Rhymes, known in many forms in early literature but made famous in print by Charles Perrault [2]. Traditionally, she is a storyteller.

Appearance and Personality

"Mother Goose was a short, stout, elderly woman. She had curly grey hair under a pointed, black pilgrim hat that had a silver buckle on the front. She wore a baggy green dress with a white ruffled collar, large boots, and thick aviator goggles around her eyes."[3]

Mother Goose is an elderly woman who likes to have a good time. She likes to gamble, have drinks (mostly spirits), and travel with her pet goose, Lester.

She starts to rhyme when she drinks. Also, she likes to call people with nicknames instead of their actual names.

Throughout the books, she casually drops hints about all of her previous adventures. She claims to have started the Renaissance. She also says she used to wrestle dragons in the Dragon Age and has a burn scar on her forearm from it.[4] In Beyond the Kingdoms, she mentions she has traveled with a traveling circus before,[5] was once buried alive[6], has a tattoo[7], spent a weekend on the Mayflower[8], and may (or may not) have started the Great Fire of London.[9] She says that she dated Leonardo Da Vinci, and Mona Lisa was one of her nicknames.

Relationships

'Mother' of Lester, a pet goose. Mother Goose won him as a golden egg from some ogres in the Dwarf Forests. She says she uses him to travel in the Otherworld to avoid detection, because when people see him they just assume he's a normal bird in the sky.

She used to be friends with people at the Red Lion Brewery in London in the mid-1800s. She put an invincibility spell on the South Bank Lion and enchanted him to be able to talk (and listen), because she kept crashing into it and needed someone to talk to after her friends from the brewery passed away.[12]

Mother Goose was the Fairy Godmother's first apprentice, but didn't want to become the next Fairy Godmother because it was too much responsibility.[17] After the Fairy Godmother dies, Mother Goose retreats to the Giant's castle in the sky, claiming she feels weary and tired, but she returns to help Alex find the Masked Man.

She officiates the marriage between Jack and Goldilocks in the Dwarf Forests.

When she and Alex are transported into a storybook about King Arthur, she meets Merlin and gets along with him so well she decides to stay in his story.[18]

Story

1. The Wishing Spell

Mother Goose is mentioned as a travel companion of the Fairy Godmother, but does not appear in this book.

2. The Enchantress Returns

Mother Goose is hired to watch Alex and Conner in the Otherworld. Meanwhile, the fairies attempt to track down the Evil Enchantress. Alex finds out about the Evil Enchantress after tricking Mother Goose into telling her and decides to try and get back to the Land of Stories to rescue their mother.

3. A Grimm Warning

It is revealed that back in the 1800s, Mother Goose gave the Grande Armée a map to a portal to the Land of Stories that would take them 200 years to travel through. She then neglected to tell anyone about it, and thought it didn't matter anymore after the gateways were all sealed in by the Fairy Godmother after the events in The Enchantress Returns.

Mother Goose hears the Three Witches' prophecy and realizes the 200 years have passed and the Grande Armée is on its way. She contacts Conner and has him check the portal to the Land of Stories on his side. In order to do so, he must access her vault in a casino in Monte Carlo to retrieve a magical panpipe which opens the portal. When he, Emmerich and Bree arrive in the Land of Stories, Mother Goose is forced to take responsibility for her actions. She helps in the battle against the dragon.

4. Beyond the Kingdoms

When Alex finds Mother Goose in the Giant's Castle in the sky, she joins her on her quest to find the Masked Man. She travels along to the Land of Oz, Neverland, and Wonderland, where she shares a hookah with the Caterpillar to find out where to find the Castle of Hearts. She and Alex end up in the story of King Arthur by mistake, being tricked by the Masked Man into going into the wrong story. She meets Merlin there and gets along with him so well she decides to stay in his story.

5. An Author's Odyssey

Mother Goose is living with Merlin and Arthur. Arthur is very distracted during his training thinking about Alex so Mother Goose talks to him and tries to get him to move on however her lecture is misinterpreted by Arthur and she accidentally promises to take him to Alex if he still likes her after he has fulfilled his 'destiny'.

6. Worlds Collide

Mother Goose is living with Merlin and Arthur. Arthur wakes her and Merlin one night and tries to get them to believe that he spoke to Alex through their dreams and that she’s in danger. They don’t believe him at first but eventually agree to go and check if things are all right. When they find out that many are in danger they set off to help. Mother Goose does the honors when Red and Froggy get married.

Quotes

"Why do we have to live in a morning kingdom? I swear I am going to move to the Eastern Kingdom. At least people know how to sleep there!"[20]

"Mother Goose! It's so good to see your face! --"If I had a gold coin for every time someone said that, I would be in debt."[21]

"Those planes have gotten so damn big they hardly leave room for the rest of us"[22]

"When I was young, I wanted to live forever. There wasn't a bridge I didn't want to cross, or a stone I wanted to leave unturned. Then I reached a certain age and everything started disappearing. My friends started to die one at a time until none of them were left. The world is always changing, but one day you wake up and realize that it's changed without you- and there's no chance of catching up to it. Your adventures are over, and you find yourself all alone with nothing left but the memories."[23]

"I remember another time when a bunch of young people went missing- we called it Woodstock, but that's a different story."[24]

"It has taken me centuries to find the place I belong. It's not the Otherworld, it's not the Fairy Palace, it's not the giant's castle- it's right here with Merlin."[25]